Phone Calls and Funerals
by JiltedYellow
Summary: Olivia sits alone in her room, unsure if she wants her phone to ring. Set at the end of "The Other Woman." One-shot. First attempt at FF.


_*This is my first attempt at fan fiction, written pretty quickly after I saw the episode. Any reviews and/or comments would be greatly appreciated :). _

_I do not own Scandal or any of the characters herein. _

_Story contains slight spoilers for "The Other Woman," episode 2 of season 2.*_

* * *

She wants her phone to ring. She's waiting for the sound to break through the silence of her room. It's a strange dichotomy, how she wants and she doesn't want. She's never been a woman who's been confused. She's always known what she wants, and how to get it. She's never been indecisive, ambivalent. She's never been pushed and pulled by waves of emotions, or other people's input, or shaky debates of right and wrong. She's always gone with her gut.

But her gut's so knotted right now, she feels like there's an impenetrable tangle winding tighter and tighter, right in the center of her.

The luminous glow of her television screen casts cold, blue light against the walls of her room. The news has been on mute for a while now, her eyes just fixed on the screen, on the moving images. She's not really watching them, her mind is somewhere else. Somewhere far and distant-a place her thoughts wander over and over again. She tries not to go there, but can't really help it.

She wants him to call, she doesn't want him to call.

In her mind, she's playing out some far away memory of him. His arms are warm around her, and she's looking up at him. She loves the way that he smiles, the joy in his eyes, and she's smiling too, a smile that originates from somewhere in her belly. The same place that the knot is now, there was a family of butterflies before, or some soft ribbon. She felt it unfurl inside of her, as all her tension faded away, every inhibition she ever held onto. It unraveled as he held onto her, and she let herself be exposed, because she knew he would take care of what he saw, and she knew she was seeing him undone as well.

"Fitz..." She doesn't realize when the name tumbles from her lips, a whisper in the stark air of her room. There is so much longing in that short little word.

And then the phone rings.

For just a moment, she feels her heart stop, and the tension in her body rises until she swears the force is enough to crack her bones. She does not move.

It rings again and then she turns her head to look at the phone. She stares at it, as though some answer would appear in the space above it, telling her what she should do. God, she wants to hear his voice. Just to know he's there on the other end of the line. Just to know he's thinking of her, that he still exists, and that she still exits to him. She has some vague romantic thought that maybe they really were connected, that he could feel her longing for him, and he was feeling it at the same time, and so he called her right then, because they were so lined up, so linked together, even psychically.

By the third ring Olivia is standing and her hand is right on the hook, right on the receiver. She knows she's going to answer it.

For some reason she looks back at the television. The mute figures scroll across the screen, a bevy of figures in black and grey making their way towards a brown box at the head of the room. It had been hours since the funeral, but the news continued to show clips. It's only for an instant, but the camera zooms in to show the reverend's wife, Nancy.

She is the picture of dignity as she approaches her husband's coffin, reaching out delicately to touch the figure of the man who some short days earlier was living and breathing and shouting "Glory to God!" next to her. She might have fooled the cameras, if the sudden crease in her brow hadn't given her away. That subtle crack showed in her face, before working its way down through her body, to her knees, and her now shaking hand. The fissure could be heard cracking in her voice, as she croaked out a sick sound, and crumbled toward the casket. The cameras caught Nancy's breakdown, caught the image of her quivering lips touching the forehead of the late reverend, caught the couple noble men who came to hold her up and help the grieving woman step away from the man she'd loved and grown with for so many years.

Olivia has seen this scene already, it's played again and again since the funeral finished. But for the first time, Olivia spots something new.

In the back of the fray, behind the mourning widow, and behind the group of compassionate men, and away from the flock of heartbroken onlookers, is a woman alone. She is tall, and stoic, and in the flash of time that she is on camera, deep despondence can be seen in her eyes. Held close to her with one arm at her waist is a young boy in glasses. He seems confused and a bit uncomfortable, not quite understanding who they're there for, or why they came. He doesn't understand why his mother keeps looking at him the way that she does, or what she means when she says "He wanted to explain things to you, son." But he can feel her shaking as the scene unfolds before them, and he hears her sharp inhale as the widow wails "My husband! My husband!" So, because he is her Little Man, and he loves her, and he hears her crying though no one else notices, he grips her forearm tightly in his small hands, craning his head back slightly to look at her face. "It's okay, Mom." He soothes, wanting with everything in him to make his mother feel better. When she nods and responds "It's okay, baby," he assumes he's succeeded. He thinks even more so when his mother turns them both around, and they walk the other way down the aisle, away from the crowd, and the crying, and the stranger in the box and his weeping wife. The cameras don't catch where they go, but Olivia assumes they leave the church.

Olivia doesn't know how many rings there have been by the time she looks back at the phone. She lets her hand drop down to her side, and she nods slightly, in a defeated way, as if she is acquiescing to some unseen foe. She frowns briefly, before turning away, and walking back to her bed. She sits, and feels the knot in her stomach continue to tighten, until she can't take it any longer, and it forces her to gag up some unforgivable noise. She clamps a hand over her mouth and lets the sob shake her for a few short moments before she can breathe again, wiping her eyes to clear away any evidence that sadness had ever dwelled on her face.

The phone stops ringing. She knows this time she won't be answering it again.


End file.
